Approximately HKD3 billion (US$385 million) in gaming revenue was generated from overseas-player zones at Macau casinos in 2024, reported Macao Daily News, citing Tuesday remarks from local legislator Ip Sio Kai.
That gaming revenue figure produced a corresponding “HKD150 million” in what the news outlet termed – citing Mr Ip – “gaming levies relief” distributed among Macau gaming operators. There are six concessionaires in the market.
Mr Ip has been leading a Legislative Assembly committee tasked with scrutinising execution of the city’s fiscal year 2024 budget. The legislator spoke to media after his committee had a closed-doors meeting on Tuesday with several government delegates, including the Secretary for Economy and Finance, Tai Kin Ip.
Amid the rejig of the local regulatory framework leading up to Macau’s current 10-year gaming concessions that started in January 2023, the government had said it might approve an up to 5-percentage point rebate on Macau’s 40-percent tax on gross gaming revenue, for play generated by overseas players using specially-designated zones within gaming facilities. The operators would have to apply for such relief.
The government calculation of the 2024 gaming levies relief had been based on gaming revenue generated from those special zones for overseas players, reported the Chinese-language media outlet, citing legislator Mr Ip.
Macau’s casino gross gaming revenue (GGR) for full-year 2024 stood at MOP226.78 billion (US$28.34 billion). On a U.S. dollar basis, the foreigner-generated gaming revenue figure for 2024 reportedly given by the government would seemingly represent about 1.36 percent of Macau casino GGR for that year.
The income from taxes on Macau’s gaming sector reached MOP88.13 billion in 2024, according to the 2024 fiscal-budget execution report. Income from such taxes had been forecast by the government to reach MOP88.56 billion in 2025, and MOP92.53 billion in 2026, according to the fiscal budget plan for those respective years.
(Updated 9.30am, Jan 14)
